When I was a kid I had the winning ticket to a door prize at a comic book convention but didn't realize it until they called the next number. I was crushed.

I won some stickers at my school, but my stupid cousin destroyed them.

I won some bum lottery tickets on a radio show for predicting a Bills win over the Raiders in the playoffs when I was in college.

But my first real legit oh my gosh win was last week: we won a VIP package to a local performing arts center: 2 tickets, VIP suite access with wine and fancy stuff and VIP parking passes for answering a survey from the time we saw Seinfeld Live.

The first thing I ever won was a spelling bee in elementary school. The prize was a copy of the Disney picture-book version of The Sword In the Stone. It was my first encounter with Arthurian legend and I loved that book so much that I still remember it 50 years later. (And, teachers take note, it made me so proud of my mad spelling skilz that I became an excellent speller for the rest of my life. Unfortunately all the kids who didn't win dropped out and became junkies.)

The nicest thing I ever won was an iPod Touch at a whiskey tasting a little over a year ago. It was a random drawing; you had to have pre-entered online and you had to be present to win. Since there were only a dozen people there I liked my odds.

Back in the Good Old Days, before the economy went to hell, companies used to throw lavish holiday parties with generous prizes. My wife won a cruise (which was the second-place prize, if you can believe that). Neither of us are the cruise type so we were less than enthused until she found out she could use the cash equivalent for any travel. We ended up taking 2 weeks in Italy -- one of our best vacations ever.

My mom had her hip replaced so we got her a powerchair (the kind that helps you sit up). The manager said we should put in for their midnight giveaway. We did, knowing we'd never win. Well...we won. We got a $5000 dollar Tempurpedic cooling bed (kinda awesome here in AZ) that we also gave to my mom. Free bed FTW.

Best thing I've won? Dunno. I win lots of little things at socials, silent auctions, etc. Once won a 27" LCD tv (about 7 years ago so it was "cool", even though it was a lame mfgr - Emerson IIRC) but I didn't need it, so I took it into a store that I knew sold Emersons to see if I could get store credit. The guy said no, he'd give me cash instead of a cash card (as it was unopened) - and handed me $450, returning the set to stock. I later found out it was purchased at another store for significantly less (~250 IIRC).

I guess it means I won the same thing twice.

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"If it weren't for Philo T. Farnsworth, inventor of television, we'd still be eating frozen radio dinners." - Johnny Carson

Christ all the things you guys have won are a million times better than the things i have won,even Ironrods Sword in the Stone book sounds better(i love that film)

-Mass Effect Hoodie,while its decent enough the velcro at the zip folds over part of the hoodie and attaches itself to the N7 logo therefore hooking on and 'unthreading' the logo..i have since cut off that velcro patch,bad design if you ask me

-Hunted:The Demon's Forge Video Game for the PS3,I really didn't like the game,and unfortunately it was a promotional copy,so i could not trade it in

I did win Stand By Me on Blu-Ray,however it was 3 months later when i realised i had won when i found the Facebook message they were asking for my details...so,okay,i didn't win that,they gave it to someone else

I think that is all i have won in my life,i can't think of anything else

Oh, I won a Famous Players gold card - free movies for a year. It was 1998-1999, IIRC. Won it from much music (Canada's MTV back then) for answering the question: Name a movie which has "gold" in the title, but isn't a bond film.

Ule's Gold was taken (so it was just after that movie was released), so I got it with Allan Quartermain and the Lost City of Gold. Mmmm, Sharon Stone being oiled up was pretty memorable for a 14yr old version of me.

Unfortunately, I saw Deep Blue Sea with that (free tickets). I was going to demand my money back DESPITE the fact that it was free.

« Last Edit: February 19, 2013, 06:36:54 PM by Purge »

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"If it weren't for Philo T. Farnsworth, inventor of television, we'd still be eating frozen radio dinners." - Johnny Carson

I won my first Xbox 360 from a Mountain Dew promotion. (winner every 10 minutes). It came with a box full of T-shirts, hats, and swag. Unfortunately getting my 360 a month before they were officially released somehow managed to screw up my xbox live membership (started active account before they HAD to be tied to a @Live ID) and after my initial year was up I had to completely restart over with a new Xbox live ID... but it was a very cool prize.

I just won this cool lifestraw from entering into a 'caption this' contest on facebook. Now I don't have to worry about getting sick from a water source after the zombie apocalypse

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A Pew Research Center poll found nearly half of Americans hold the false belief that TARP was passed under President Obama, while only 34 percent know it originated under Bush."Oh yeah?" Bush replied. "50% of the people were wrong."

Back in the day when Activision was releasing "Heavy Gear 2" they had a contest where they were giving away an autographed "gold master" disk of the game and a bunch of other swag that I don't recall. I won.

I won this poster by being one of the first people to enter in on a contest for when Might and Magic VI: The Mandate of Heaven came out. Basically like 15 minutes in a code shows up and you mail it off:

(not my picture of it)

Now, take a good close look at it. Tell me exactly where everyone is in relation to each other. Depth included. Who is looking at what, where, why, and how?

Slightly better quality pic in here based off of the title screen (but smaller)

Spoiler for Hiden:

Still a cool poster. Still have mine up to this day. I just never think of the logistics of it as it gives me a headache.

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"All opinions posted are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled."

I won a copy of the first Dungeon Siege a week or two before it came out. It was a special "Gold Release" press of the disk signed by Chris Taylor. Even cooler the entire dev team was playing multiplayer a bunch that dead week. Got to play a game with CT for a while.

It was a kinda funny contest. They were randomly turning on a signup form on a bunch of fan sites. Each site let the first 5 or 10 people win and the rest went into a random winner pool. The inventive CS student I was, I wrote a quick script to poll the sites for updates and sound an alarm. Got like 2nd or 3rd on the 2nd site to go live.

Second best was pizza for a year.

So a local cheap pizza chain (Pizza Guys) dropped and empty box on my steps with a note that said "bring this in on Saturday for a free pizza!" They were having a summer party and did this to a bunch of people that ordered often. Well I bring it in to get my pizza the next day and they let me know I get a spin at the wheel. I spin it and win pizza for a year (1 per month, any size, any toppings). We got pretty creative with massive toppings combos over the next year.

In junior high - I once won a raffle and got a $100 bill which they gave to me at lunch. Unfortunately someone else stole it from me before the end of the day and the school had called my father to tell him that I had won the money. So when he came to pick me up after school and we discovered it had been stolen - I got a beating and was grounded for two weeks.

In the mid-90's i entered a contest on AOL (I know... the shame...) for the movie Hackers (with a young angelina jolie). Apparently not enough people entered, so with my one entry they sent me 3 copies of the movie on VHS and two posters.

Back in the late 90's I won a brand new palm pilot 5 from the tucows website, along with a bunch of fun little desk toys.

During the first year that American idol was on the air, I entered a ford contest during the show and won a high end VCR.

When I was a kid I lived overseas in West Berlin, and was forced to wait an extra year to see Empire Strikes Back (in English). The nearby youth center ran an essay contest to win 2 tickets to see it the day it came out and I entered and won. Saw the very first matinee they played at the theater, turned around and used my second ticket and saw it again

A long time ago, I won an IGN contest. I had forgotten that I had entered, but they sent me a copy of Majesty. Considering that I hadn't heard of the game at the time and now rate it as one of my all time favorites, I'd put that prize much higher than the monetary value.

I once won a closest to the pin contest in a golf tournament. True, it was for the highest handicap category, but I did win a golf bag. Given my overall lack of athletic accomplishments, I'm pretty proud of that.

When I was a kid I lived overseas in West Berlin, and was forced to wait an extra year to see Empire Strikes Back (in English). The nearby youth center ran an essay contest to win 2 tickets to see it the day it came out and I entered and won. Saw the very first matinee they played at the theater, turned around and used my second ticket and saw it again

So when the big reveal hit in the second showing, were you watching the screen or other people's faces?

When I was a kid I lived overseas in West Berlin, and was forced to wait an extra year to see Empire Strikes Back (in English). The nearby youth center ran an essay contest to win 2 tickets to see it the day it came out and I entered and won. Saw the very first matinee they played at the theater, turned around and used my second ticket and saw it again

So when the big reveal hit in the second showing, were you watching the screen or other people's faces?

Actually, I was in denial until Jedi- I was convinced Vader was just fucking with Luke and it totally wasn't true.

I won this poster by being one of the first people to enter in on a contest for when Might and Magic VI: The Mandate of Heaven came out. Basically like 15 minutes in a code shows up and you mail it off:

(not my picture of it)

Now, take a good close look at it. Tell me exactly where everyone is in relation to each other. Depth included. Who is looking at what, where, why, and how?

Slightly better quality pic in here based off of the title screen (but smaller)

Spoiler for Hiden:

Still a cool poster. Still have mine up to this day. I just never think of the logistics of it as it gives me a headache.

Can't tell you how many times my DnD party of Dragon, Death Knight, Mage and Dragon Knight had to fight a rampaging Archer and Barbarian.

Close call, my friend. That archer is a BITCH to kill.

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"If it weren't for Philo T. Farnsworth, inventor of television, we'd still be eating frozen radio dinners." - Johnny Carson

One time, at a college orientation walk-around, I won a DVD player in a Dance Contest. Me and this girl got picked to go against each other for the DVD player, and they chose two people out of the crowd to be our "partner." The girl got some nondescript male partner and I got this black girl. And she was a dominator of the dance. They hit the music and she just went into this sensual, like, tornado of dances and thrusts, and I just kind of jiggled around behind her in a rhythmic pulse. She won that damn DVD player for me, but since I was the contestant I was the one that got it, and she didn't get anything.

I ended up selling it for $50 so that I could buy some cigarettes and food.

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Heard about Houston? Heard about Detroit? Heard about Pittsburgh P.A.?